Capitalist cooptation

I6

I think the most dire consequence of the evolution of capitalism today is its capacity for cooptation. It is extremely adept at commodifying and co-opting any sort of movement at all, even the most radical. I think that the reformist strategies, whether they’re NGOs, or unions, or other things….I wouldn't say I reject all of them I would just say that all of those in and of themselves are not sufficient.

Managing disagreement effectively

I18

Thoughtless action is obviously going to lead to unintended consequences and it's going to be less effective than if you are measured and considered and reasonable and have a plan and account for contingencies....I think it's really important but at the same time I think that the left does suffer from too much...crippling talk. There should be more mechanisms in left wing groups if there is a major point of disagreement to compartmentalize that disagreement, and not to ignore it, but to defer it...until we're effective with all the stuff we agree with.

A revolving door of resistance

I12

I feel like it's a revolving door of resistance where people are...doing stuff and they leave or people become disgruntled with it and then [even though] more people...are becoming politicized, they're not necessarily taking it a step further and really trying to push that agenda of active resistance and direct resistance against the state. [My] frustration with that is the lack of people who really want to get involved but I also have to remind myself that the place where I am at right now has taken fifteen years [for me to get to].

Radical sympathies

I27

My perspective has been coming from a radical, egalitarian position. I know that there are many different points one can attack something [from], but the point is to draw the links between those things….So yeah, I have an anarchist-communist outlook, that doesn't mean I'm not sympathetic to other things and other perspectives.

Hope and fear for the future

I10

I draw a lot of my inspiration, especially when it comes to environmental activism, from the compassion that I have for the planet, from the emotional connection that I've built to the earth through many excursions, and wilderness trips, and exploring in nature, and the huge amount of appreciation I have for the world around me. So yeah, compassion, that is where I draw a lot of my inspiration from and also a little bit of fear and anger as well....Fear for the future. If nobody does anything then what is our future going to look like?

Solidarity and sectarianism

I11

After the student day of action, the organizers of the student day of action, sent a really, really nasty message about why did we have to go and yell chants that weren't the chants they wanted us to yell. Like, ‘what was that all about? Are you trying to act more radical than [us?]’ It felt like we'd kind of gone out in solidarity with them…..So after that I felt like we weren't on the same team.

Reaching people

I7

There's lots of people who, if you tap into their values in the right way, will be able to get onside with you in a way that at least will keep us going, that at least will keep us on a more positive track. I think it's just a matter of bringing out those values and framing them in such a way that they enable us to make more intelligent political decisions.

Outrage, movements, and institutionalization

I17

Protests, they get a lot of attention, but unless you have millions of people it's not going to amount to anything and one of the things governments have learned is that volunteers wear out eventually. You can't sustain a white-hot movement indefinitely without becoming an institution. So as soon as that happens you've lost the white-hot outrage that got you started….In order to have the kind of impact [you] want, [you] have to become something different then [you]...started out to be.

Vision

I24

I think that the communist movement in the early part of the twentieth century did have a vision, I'm not sure that it was the right vision, but they had a vision. They did believe that somehow or other they were going to take over the state and institute a social society. I think that was the wrong vision but it was a vision, and one of the things that you find from reading some of the historical stuff is that they saw themselves as separate from the system, they saw themselves as outside the system, they saw themselves as creating a new society. The history and practice of state control as it got exercised in the Soviet Union and [elsewhere] shows that at least [that] way of achieving that vision proved to be wrong, but at least they had a vision. The problem today is that we don't have a vision outside of the system.

Post-activism

I2

Recently, as a result of being in a family, [I’ve] really change[d] the way...I'm socially engaging with…[the] activist community….I feel like there was a certain point at which I started to admire people that I considered post-activist. What I [mean] by that is that being an activist or revolutionary or whatever as your main title, that is abstract and has nothing to communicate other than that you feel righteously busy. [It’s] not something that...I want to identify [as] and I feel like there are some other really important things, really important roles....I want to be a good son to my parents, I want to be a good brother to my brother, I want to be a good parent, I want to be a good partner.